CREDITS (LEFT TO RIGHT): ADAPTED FROM M. DEGUILLOUX ET AL., EVOLUTIONARY ANTHROPOLOGY, 21, (JAN-FEB 2012); GÖRAN BURENHULT (Michael Balter, Ancient Migrants Brought Farming Way of Life to Europe.Science336,400-401(2012).DOI:10.1126/science.336.6080.400)
Abstract
The farming way of life originated in the Near East some 11,000 years ago and had reached most of the European continent 5000 years later. However, the impact of the agricultural revolution on demography and patterns of genomic variation in Europe remains unknown. We obtained 249 million base pairs of genomic DNA from ~5000-year-old remains of three hunter-gatherers and one farmer excavated in Scandinavia and find that the farmer is genetically most similar to extant southern Europeans, contrasting sharply to the hunter-gatherers, whose distinct genetic signature is most similar to that of extant northern Europeans. Our results suggest that migration from southern Europe catalyzed the spread of agriculture and that admixture in the wake of this expansion eventually shaped the genomic landscape of modern-day Europe.
P. Skoglund et al., Origins and Genetic Legacy of Neolithic Farmers and Hunter-Gatherers in Europe. Science 336, 466-469(2012). DOI:10.1126/science.1216304
The paper, published in Science, was also featured as an issue highlight, podcast and reported in the Science News & Analysis by M Balter.
The paper received outstanding media coverage both in Sweden and abroad, e.g. Uppsala Nya Tidning (TV interview with Dr. Sugden, and print article), Dagens Nyheter, Sveriges Radio (1, 2), Spiegel Online, Der Standard, Focus Online, Le Figaro, Los Angeles Times, The Wall Street Journal, BBC News, NPR blog, CNN KETK, The Guardian, La Repubblica.